I can´t help it, my default mode has been to find "solutions" where I see "problems"... I´m often consciously or unconsciously doint it, whether is fixing a broken coffee machine or finding solutions for a comunity to have water for farming.
It´s been interesting to observe that when the thought came to my mind that I don´t need to "fix" the many social problems I see around me in Angola (in my point of view), I also noticed a stillness in my mind... I actually stopped looking for solutions.
It´s really not up to a foreigner passing by to bring solutions, even though I love these people and this land dearly and I so wished everyone had all their basic needs met.
The same is true for when I try to find solutions for a region far from my own. All we can do from afar is to listen and witness, and try our best to not be part of the problem.
Solutions need to come from the community where the problems reside. The identification and definition of "problem" and "solution" have to come from local long term residents.
The challenge here, and in many societies in the world today, is that there is a community with people from different cultures, different ways of doing things and even different values.
Another big problem in my perspective (you see, I keep identifying problems) is when one of the cultures is more dominating, in the past or present, and thinks their ways and values are "better" or "more evolved", especially if that culture was or is dominating the other.
Acceptance of difference has to be the start. No judgement, no trying to "fix", "heal" or "improve". And then identifying the differences, the important values and what is considered "right" and "wrong" within each different culture that constitutes the larger community.
Here in Angola we might be missing parts of many local cultures and some are even at risk of extinction because the language is being lost.
The colonial culture of the past is still very dominant as it imposed the language, the cosmology and a lot of the values, so today most people don't even know their roots, the values of their tribes and what was considered "right" and "wrong"...
The damage is done! and it cannot be repaired. This was a hard realisation.
Some things can still be repaired, but so much has been lost and destroyed. As hard as it is to admit it , there is no way to fix what was done.
Maybe it is good that local native languages don't have a past tense on the verbs´ conjugations. The future is built with the present and with what we have today...
It almost requires the creation of a new culture where all parts are heard and decide together what the future culture will look like... Look at Europe! We cannot see the pre-roman cultures anymore, it´s not obvious at least... We can see the differences between the different european cultures, but maybe those too will become something else. We love to hold on to specific identities, but isn´t evolution natural? The question is, which direction do we choose to evolve to? Are we willing to embrace diversity or do we want to hold on to particularity? In my opinion both are equally important.
Who is willing to listen to the other? Who is willing to sit as equals in a circle where there is no hierarchical powers or patronizing atitudes?
In Angola and many other colonized countries, the settled, consumerist and academic white culture meets the hunter-gatherer "uneducated" Bantu culture...
I listened to the frustration of white people living in Africa, the same way I listen to north europeans frustrated with rural portuguese lifestyle, or the urban attitude towards the country...The former often thinks they know better than the latter...
I understand the frustrations, the same way I understand a disagreement between a married couple... We both have to be able to listen and live with each other´s differences within a circle where each perspective is valid...
The big mistake I see has been the idea that "my way is the only way", or "the best way", and we´ve been missing out the voice and images of the minorities that are unheard and unseen...
If I am to look for solutions or improvement of life conditions, I would focus in the region I live in and belong to, and, of course, to my own lifestyle and choices of consumption.
We are all connected... The whole planet and all humankind. And when one suffers, we all suffer.
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